No comments about Exceptional Spaces: Essays in Performance and History.

3 comments about Jackson Pollock.

1. This intelligent and lavishly illustrated volume, which first appeared in a 1989 hardcover edition, covers Pollock's entire career, his early influences, and the progression of the themes, techniques, and accomplishments of his life as an artist. Ellen Landau's text is enlightening, but the best part of this book is, inevitably, the illustrations themselves, which are an unparalleled feast for the eyes. For those who want to experience and understand Pollock's art (rather than dwell on his personal problems) this is an excellent choice.



2. Before Varnedoe and Karmel's Pollock monograph, which accompanied the MOMA / Tate retrospective a few yeas ago, this was the best available text-and-plates book about Pollock. In terms of its text, this book is still relevant and insightful. Like Elizabeth Frank, Landau does a lot of truly eye-opening comparison work throughout her book. She'll reprint a work by Picasso, say, or a Native American artifact, or a Pollock sketch, and then analyze the influence it exerted on one of Pollock's key canvases.

   And unlike the Varnedoe/Karmel book, this volume reprints these several kinds of works in close proximity, often on the same or a facing page, a useful feature. Landau's remarks about Pollock's sources, outcomes, growth and directions are always at least provocative and often really instructive, particularly in her coverage of the late black paintings. Indeed, Landau's analysis is regularly listed and praised in other authors' bibliographies.

   The drawbacks of the book are its numerous poor reproductions, and plates after all make the primary reason for buying an artist monograph. Many of the plates are excellent and crisp--"Lucifer," "Pasiphae," "Autumn Rhythm," the colorful, playful works following Pollock's marriage. But too many of the plates and fold-outs are muddy, and Pollock's use of silver or aluminum paint is simply beyond this book's ability--as with the gaudy and over-exposed looking gatefold that opens the book. "Blue Poles" and "Stenographic Figure" are among the book's other poor reprints. Until I saw the Varnedoe/Karmel reprint of "One: Number 31, 1950," and then again in "person" at the MOMA, I just flatly didn't understand how Pollock had approached it. It looks "ok" in Landau, but with a lessened resolution that just slightly confuses the webbing throughout.

   Still, I value the book and particularly its text. As for the reproduction quality, I did buy a second copy to cannibalize it; I've posted many laminated pages throughout my classroom. But I got that copy at remaindered prices. At full cost, this is a 3 1/2 or 4 star book. At bargain prices, the book rates 4 or 4 1/2 stars. Varnedoe/Karmel is just visually superior.




3. This beautiful book with an anthology of Pollock's work; along with the details of his life, was very engrossing. I was unfamiliar with his work; although I do collect some artwork. When I saw and read the book from the coffee table of a friend's home over the holidays; I couldn't wait to order from Amazon.com for my copy. A recent find of Pollock's work was shown on David Letterman. It sold for millions after being locked away in a closet for many years. Beautiful book for a fantastic artist.

No comments about The Unpicturelikeness of Pollock, Soutine & Others:Selected Writings & Talks by Louis Finkelstein.

2 comments about Jackson Pollock: Memories Arrested in Space.

1. This book was a revelation to me! I've always loved the strength
   and delicacy of Pollock's works, without ever being able to place the undercurrent of violence and black rage in it. Now I understand. What a fascinating picture of how an artist can turn
   what to others would be crippling limitations into lasting beauty!
   Thank you, Martin Gray, for opening my eyes.



2. I enjoyed the iambic trimeter of the book. The prose feels spare but got me in sideways into Pollock's consciousness. Well worth reading for anyone who wants to understand modern art. Pollock would have benefited from a more religious upbringing. Who knows what he might have accomplished had he not been so internally tortured?

No comments about Jackson Pollock.

4 comments about The Essential: Jackson Pollock (Essentials).

1. Wow, now I GET what this guy's all about. Who knew? Can't wait to go to New York and see the Pollock exhibition now. It's very cool that he was sometimes so drunk he used the palm of his hand to "sign" his paintings!



2. This book is a great first step in learning about the artist's life and understanding his work. It is a quick read, and you will learn much about Pollock and how his style was developed without overloading you on unneccessary detail. Um...Like...Buy The Book!!!



3. Um...Like...underline...superficial...as if! This book is cute but it's so simple and silly, it made me feel like I was hearing the story of a great and influential artist, being told by a pretentious poser. The points it covers really are interesting and important but I think this book is a bit annoying.



4. The author gives us the fundamentals on Pollock, the man, the painter, the influences, the critics, contemporary painters, plus Pollock's wife Lee Krasner and other supporters. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

No comments about Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner (Pegasus Library).

4 comments about Jackson Pollock: Veiling the Image.

1. What a delight this book is. Pollock's paintings are presented in their historical and cultural context. The text drew me more and more into Pollock's world, making me eager to look, really look, more and more at the spectacular paintings. In the reading and the looking I felt like I was traveling the path of this unique American artist in his process of self-discovery and artistic expression. This book is a real pleasure! I'm going back to read and look again!



2. The author does with words what Pollock did with paint. Don Wigal hurls and drips facts around simple organizational concepts. Comments about an actress' Brooklyn accent sit within a larger skein of Pollock the rebel cowboy. Besides being enjoyable, these slipping-in-from-the-side factoids, they present a continually changing perspective on Pollock. These fresh viewpoints make it easier to understand Pollock as a real person.
   It would have been better if the illustrations of Pollock's work were more related to the text. They are very well done, however. You can see the texture of the paint.
   Wigal places Pollock, his genius and his personal failings, in the fabric of both his own time and larger questions of science, philosophy, and history. The book sent my head spinning after several pages; it is best read a bit at a time, then savored.



3. Wigal's "Veiling the Image" is a new vision of Pollock -- something completely grand & overarching as nothing else I've read & reinvigorates things for today's minds. It's complex, incredibly interesting, imaginative & makes one desire to re-engage with it's sense of contemporary relevancy & beauty. The text is fascinating & compelling -- actually awesome & totally readable. It examines Harris's film & moves forward to 2005 including interviews about my own yet to be released www.Pollocksquared.com indie feature.
   
   Wigal's incredibly researched all of this not only philosophically but poured it all out in more fresh ways than one can imagine with wonderful fresh vignettes not only about Pollock in great detail but his milieux including Ruth Kligman, DeKooning, Agnes Martin, Frank O'Hara, Larry Rivers, includes references to many artists & critics of today including fractal scientist Richard Taylor. It even explores the market as related to Pollock's prices. The perfect unified one in all book for any Pollock lover or for people who never got it before -- because they will now. Does what other books can't. It looks like publisher Parkstone spared no expense in every aspect of quality control with this wonderful & beautiful production. It makes sense for today's modern audience.
   
   For myself as an artist the vast number of large Pollock reproductions & their clarity of color & sharpness surpass by far the best I've seen of any Pollock's before. They're in a class by themselves. Many images were also completely new to me & very appreciated. Wigal's made it all happen, every aspect, coming totally alive in fresh imaginative ways in dimensions I've never remotely seen explored before.
   I'll be exploring it for a long while.
   
   Bill Rabinovitch
   rabinart@aol.com
   www.Pollocksquared.com



4. I must confess to having litle appreciation of the work of Jackson Pollock before reading Donald Wigal's "Pollock: Veiling the Image." This was surely due in large part to my bias in favor of representational art--a bias that endures. But this book has brought me to a genuine appreciation of a major artist. A light went on when I read: "Several artists stress the theme about Abstract Expressionism in theory, but some acted it out less convincingly in their work. Likewise, other artists observe the effect paint has when dripped on to a surface, but none before Pollock developed it into the brilliant visual polyphony he made happen" (94). That phrase, "brilliant visual polyphony," was the light switch. I suddenly realized the kinship between abstract impressionism and music. I would never have demanded that a concerto have an identifiable subject. Thanks to Donald Wigal and to the marvelous reproductions in this book, I now recognize that Pollock is at his best when he is least representational, and that Pollock at his best is brilliant.
   It occurs to me that there is a polyphonic quality to Wigal's text that mirrors the subject: There is, within a clear organization, a polyphonic overlay of cultural history, biographical fact, psychological observations, and critical insights, that is ingeniously suited to the complexity of the subject. Here art criticism reaches a high artistic level in its own right, and I find myself personally enriched.
   If "Jackson Pollock: Veiling the Image" can do for others what it has done for me, it should be a valuable and enduring contribution to art criticism.
   
   Joseph H. Wessling

No comments about American Art 1908-1947: From Winslow Homer to Jackson Pollock.

No comments about Jackson Pollock's Blue Poles.